Falling
by Pantz
Summary: When she thought about him, she thought about his hair. Red and vibrant and so crazy that she just had to touch it lest she go insane.


Disclaimer: Everything from hp books belongs to jk rowling

**Falling**

He left for war when he was seventeen.

He was so young, a child, a fierce child with sparkling eyes thinking that this was it. This was the excitement he had been waiting for his entire life.

She said goodbye to him with teary eyes as his hands rested on her plaid school skirt.

She wore her uniform that day, her hair wildly falling down her shoulders and her eyes fearful, so fearful, of what tomorrow would bring.

_Stay_, she had asked in a pitiful voice. So out of character, so different from her, because she was loud and outspoken and never one to beg. She was supposed to be the embodiment of strength.

_Please, don't go. I need you._ It was painful for him and terrible for her but he shook his head and told her that it was his time to do something for the world. It was his turn to be heroic.

_Harry needs me_, whispered with her hand clasped tightly inside his and his face so close his nose fell deep into her brown tresses.

_Harry has a world of people to help him. You don't need to risk your life. You can help in other ways._

His eyes clouded over and he moved away from her, their hands still tightly clasped. His head shook and her heart broke.

_Don't you understand? I have to do this. I **have **to!_

The thing was, she didn't understand, couldn't understand, wouldn't allow herself to understand. For once in her life, she only allowed herself to believe those selfish thoughts in her mind that push away the reason and logic she always held onto for dear life.

She allowed herself to believe he could be content with her as all his friends went off to fight.

There was a kiss. Quick and soft and not nearly enough for her to be left with. His hand loosened, left hers limb by her side, and he was gone a moment later.

Tears polluted her face but she remained frozen in the moment. Her lips remained cold and her eyes stone and when it began to rain only the persistence of Ginny could make her come inside.

_He had forgotten to tell her that he loved her._

When she thought about him, she though about his hair. Red and vibrant and so crazy that she just had to touch it lest she go insane. She thought about his laugh and the tingles she got in her stomach when she heard it and the way it just made her free.

She would close her eyes and try to hear it in her mind with every day that passed just so she could have a moment of light.

She tried to laugh and tried to smile and tried to care when Ginny gossiped to keep their mind of the war. She tried to forget that her boy was out there risking his life to try to be something he never was. Ron was no hero and she never wanted him to be one.

She would rather he be alive.

She played wizard's chess in the common room and exploding snap and sat at tables with her texts books covering every inch of free space. She ate sweets for Christmas and chocolate for Valentines Day and laughed at the pranks Ginny bought on their few trips to Hogsmeade.

She did her best to remember how to be a kid.

Days passed, months passed and she graduated Hogwarts and moved into a small, apartment in London working close with the ministry.

She moved in and loaded her apartment with charms and spells and protection because she was so afraid. She was so very scared of death.

What is more scary than that looming threat following her every step and haunting her dreams?

She was a muggleborn, did you know that?

She was muggleborn and fierce and passionate and so drained from all the pain and tears and deaths of the people she loved most that she was sure she had no more life inside of her.

Hannah Bones, sweet Hannah, died a week before graduation while visiting her parents.

Neville died fighting beside Harry.

Seamus, she heard, was half mad in St. Mungo's from Death Eater torture.

And Ron, Ron she never heard a word of. Not an utter.

She sometimes pictured him. Eyes closed, mouth still, his face as pale as a ghost. She imagined a peaceful countenance and her thoughts as she wondered if, possibly, he was only asleep.

She wondered this and thought she was going mad.

And it was possible that she was.

When he was nineteen, he showed up at her apartment, saved from bodily casualty but broken in a way that can never be fixed.

He no longer believed in the glamour of being a hero.

She looked at him and no longer believed that the fight had been won.

It was the last time she saw him as he stood at her doorstep, his red hair wet from rain and his eyes so horribly dead.

She thought she was seeing a ghost.

He brought news of Harry's death. He brought news of victory. He brought nothing but pain as he turned and walked away.

He kissed her before he left. It was hollow and brutal and she's sure she has a battle scar on her lips from where he touched her.

_Ron, come in. I'll make tea. You'll feel better once you have had some tea,_ she had whispered. It was a plea, a plea for the simplicity of life before the war.

_Hermione_, he said her name so quietly that she thought she must have imagined it. _Hermione, I need to go._

_No, no you never have to go anywhere again._ She wanted that new life to begin. That new life of marriage and kids and possibly some semblance of love and happiness. She wanted that new life that will finally allow all this to be in her past.

She was broken and he was broken and a little part of her hoped that they could be broken together.

_I love you, Ron._

It never registered to her that there was no turning back. That this, _all of this_, is something that can never be forgotten.

It never registered to her that he didn't love her anymore. Couldn't love her anymore.

Thunder shouted in the sky, lightening fell miles away yet flashed his face into an eerie glow that would have frightened her if she didn't know for certain that he was real.

_Goodbye, Hermione_.

Two words and then he was gone. Vanished out of her life as quickly as he came in it and she has wondered, since that day, why her heart never broke, why before he left he didn't tell her he loved her.

The bad thing was, the worst thing, was that she couldn't understand what had happened. It was a war. That was it. That was all it would ever be.

And yet, it was so much more than that.


End file.
